‘True Story’ Trailer: Jonah Hill Digs Into a Mystery

Actor James Franco always seems to be adept at keeping a lot of plates spinning; even as one of his films is kicking off an international incident he has half a dozen more projects in the pipeline, including a true story thriller from director Rupert Goold that is, rather appropriately, called True Story.

True Story is based on a memoir by journalist Michael Finkel, who was fired from The New York Times in 2001 for fabricating large parts of a story he wrote on the African slave trade. Jonah Hill stars as Finkel and Franco plays Christian Longo, a man convicted of murdering his wife and children who used Finkel’s name as an alias while on the run from the police.

As with the story that got Finkel fired from the Times, it’s unclear to what extent True Story will actually be a true story and how much of it will be embellished with extra drama, but it’s good to see Hill taking another step outside his comedic comfort zone after the roles in Moneyball and The Wolf of Wall Street that earned him Oscar nominations. True Story actually has more than one Moneyball connection, since it was also produced by Brad Pitt.

True Story marks Goold’s feature directorial debut, though he recently wrote and directed an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Richard II for TV, called The Hollow Crown. Goold also co-wrote the screenplay for True Story with David Kajganich (The Invasion), who has also worked on multiple upcoming Stephen King adaptations including Pet Sematary, IT and The Stand.

Felicity Jones (The Theory of Everything) also stars in True Story, but unfortunately it looks like she’s been relegated to a “concerned wife” role. The rest of the cast includes Ethan Suplee (The Wolf of Wall Street), Gretchen Mol (Boardwalk Empire) and Robert John Burke (Law & Order: SVU). True Story doesn’t really come across as a must-see movie in the trailer, but it might be worth checking out if you can find a local screening.